Portable computing devices (also referred to herein as handheld devices) such as Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), Pocket Personal Computers (PPCs), or the like are readily available in the market place. These devices have a substantially smaller form factor than other portable computer devices such as laptop computers and, accordingly, are becoming increasingly popular. Due to their small form factor, they frequently accompany a person during working hours to schedule meetings, read e-mail, and perform a host of other functions.
Notwithstanding, their small form factor, these handheld devices have relatively high processing capabilities and may interact with a variety of more powerful computers, running sophisticated software applications that access large databases. During such interactions, a handheld device typically synchronizes its local content or data with that of another database. Such synchronization operations may relate to newly scheduled meetings or activities, entered by an instructing person but to be performed by another designated person.
However, due to the global and decentralized nature of business, the person instructing or scheduling an activity, and the person designated to perform the activity, may be in different time zones. Thus, an activity scheduled at a particular local time in a handheld device located in one time zone, and subsequently communicated to another handheld device located in another time zone, would not be reflected in the local time of the person designated to perform the activity, but rather in the local time of the person designating the activity.